Full text of "Electronic Games (1981 - 1985)"

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‘WARGAMES’ M* 
The Ultimate 
Gaming Fiiy/ J| 

The World IX 
Series of Videq^l * 
Baseball k §Li 
THE SUMMER ^ 
GAME GOES V 
ELECTRONIC! \ 


tmsm 

























You thinks You try bein chased around by 
it’s all fun and that fat swab Brutusk, without 
j ® games bein the a chance to catch yer b reath, 
woild’smost 

„ - famousk sailor? 

Then, I suggests 
hearts. Or else, you tries it yerself. 

You try makin points 
with Ohve Oyl, that fickle, 
damanding, stringbean of a 
dame. Likes you got nothin 

better to do than runnin . ,, ,, 

around tryin to catchher And 111 tells ya,tiiat big blubber 

hearts ^fcand notes. hafiaint as dumb ashelooks.^^ 



> os yo gets yer spinach, they oil runs owl 


hearts a nd notes. 


You try doin all that whilst 
yer gettin pelted with beer 
bottles by that discustipatin 


Sea Hag. 

She ain’t no /, 
lady, that’s 
fer sure. • 

And you try fightin off the 
vultures whilst Olive screams 
forH-E-LP. 

And you try to keep from 
gettin yerself killed by them 
bouncin skulls. I doesn’t 
know where they comes from, 
but I doesn’t like ’em one bit. 

Andwoist 
°fah.whilst 
\ y° ure doing 








YA CAN’T BE WIMPY 
IF YA WANTS TA 
PLAYPOPEYE. 


Olive drops notes whilst 
you runs around tryln 
to moke points. 


. 0 , 


^ they keeps movin the 
spinach around so’s you can 
never find it when you needs 
it. Blow me down, it ain’t 
hardly fair. 

I’ll tell ya, ya gotsta be some 
Mnda sailor to play Popeye.® 

You gotsta be fast. And ya 
gotsta thrive underpressure. 

Cuz, me home video 
is just like the hit < 
game by Nintendo... 

With three screens of 


non-stop action and in- Just one piece of advice, 
credulous graphics. I doesn’t suggest ya tries it 
So’s if it’s a challenge yer if ya eats yer spinach in a 
lookin for, and ya thinks quiche, 

ya gots what it takes, why be 
messin around with them 



MR4RKER 
BROTHERS 








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ejEg tra gfig 



FEATURES 


THE MINER 
2049er' STORY 


GAME GOES 




SWITCH ON!.6 what's an Apple I, doing in a family 

HOTLINE.10 rSCfeSw- M n 

READERS REPLAY.22 HOME |»/| 

STRATEGY SESSION.38 ARCADING Ip# 

PROGRAMMABLE STEPS OUT U I 

PARADE.54 

ARCADE AMERICA.66 

COMPUTER GAMING.72 nR MGM /UAWAGES 

'WARGAMES' 


THE PLAYERS 
GUIDE TO 
THE SUMMER 
COIN-OPS 


COMPUTING 
ON THE OLD 
CAMPG- 






















WOW! 

SUPER! 

NEAT! 

AWESOME! 

DECENT! 



the way. All compatible 

systems. Unique 
challenges and strategies 
that defy boredom. 

Avalon Hill Video Games. 
Worth the wait. 

Worth getting excited about. 


At finer video, toy & hobby stores everywhere! 


imp 


The AVALON HILL Video Game Company 

4517 HARFORD ROAD, BALTIMORE, MARYLAND 21214 (301) 254-5300 

























WITH SPECTRAVIDEO'S 
COMPUMATE 

AND YOUR ATARI VCS™, YOU CAN... 














to challenge 
almost anyone.” 

That's right. And that’s not all. 

Electronic Games calls the Kid 
"Hypnotic, appealing, fast-moving 
arcade action of the highest 
calibre, ...one of the most com¬ 
pulsive, utterly addictive contests 
in the world of computer 
gaming.” 

We couldn't agree more. 

What will the critics say about 
Juice!? Will they like its colorful 
graphics, superior sound effects, 
charming characters and chal¬ 
lenging play patterns? 

Why wait around to find out? 
































TO BEAT OUR NEW HOME VIDEO GAME, 
YOU’VE GOT TO MOVE YOUR BUNS. 



If you've been waiting for the home version of one of America's hottest 
arcade games, your order is ready Introducing BurgerTime™* from Mattel 
Electronics. For your Intellivision,® Atari®2600, 

I Apple®ll,**Aquarius™**or IBM® Personal Computer 
Your job is to climb up the ladders and 
I assemble an order of giant hamburgers. But 
I you've got to do it fast because you're being 
I chased by killer hot dogs, sour pickles and a very 
nasty fried egg. 

Good thing you've got your pepper shaker 
One shake and they're stunned. 

But just make sure you don't run out of pepper Because you know what 
happens then. 

You stop making lunch. And 
you start becoming it. 




on. © Mattel Electronics. Inc. 


FROM MATTEL ELECTRQIHK® 





























HANG ON TO YOUR ATARI VCS. 
THE FIRST VIDEO GAMES TO TRIPLE 
ITS POWER ARE ON THE WAY. 




CBS INTRODUCES 
RAM PLUS. 

Just like that, you're streaking 
across the sky at Mach 3 or running 
through a maze with 20 foot walls. 

What gives? Our new RAM PLUS™ 
power chip. It gives RAM PLUS games 
like WINGS™ and TUNNEL RUNNER” 
(coming this summer) a memory 3 
times as powerful as ordinary games. 

That means our "3-D" graphics 
rival any system around. You get the 
realistic action, extra detail, added game 
screens and arcade-quality sound you 

You're in the cockpit as WINGS 
matches your flying skills against an all¬ 
cruise missile attack. Check air 
sd, altitude, radar compass and fuej((l 
then blast away with cannons, lasers 
and Sidewinder missiles. The free BOOSTER-GRIP” increases your firepower with 
buttons! In TUNNEL RUNNER, you don’t look down on the maze, 
monsters close in on you. So check the map, plot your strategy 
and find the exit fast. Your reward? A new and 
tougher maze. 

So if you never thought an Atari VCS game 
could send you flying and running for your life, 
hang on tight. Our first 2 RAM PLUS games 
are on the way 


?P'e< 














































Which player is about 
to score with flying colors? 


Better learn fast. Here comes Galaxiair from Atari. 


Pilot to co-pilot. Galaxian invaders are 
approaching your home. And they’re only 
from Atari for use with the ATARI® 2600','' 
Sears Video Arcadet systems, and the 
ATARI 5200'" SuperSystem. 

These Galaxians look, sound, and act no 
different than the Galaxians you’ve battled 
in the arcade. They swoop, dodge, and fire 
with equal cunning. So you have to know 



Like the player on the left. He’s 
hit a flying yellow Flagship for 150 points. 
But his opponent, on the right, r “ - 
will score only 30 points for hit- I 
ting the stationary blue * 

Drone. Ttough luck, rookie 
If you want to know even 
more about which Galaxians ATA QI 
' it, hit the stores for nlnl\J 


) ior 150 points. 

A 







THE NATIONAL VANITY BOARD 



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ESST"* KT'^ 1 

sssaaSi rrsr s:s 

Su. EsE*,,« asS," SS&s. 

ST... Em™ slaSU SSs. 


BIST sr i|r |§r 

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Mostly sunny, highs in the upper 9000’s. 


Solar Storm" warnings 
are in effect. 

The sun has exploded 
and the forecast is doom 
and destruction for your 
planet unless you stop the 
solar fallout and the inva¬ 
sion of alien Deltoids. 
Bnnarrff. Kgonk. Brrullll. 
Drat, your defendership 
has been useless against 
I the solar flak and alien 
V laserbolts. 

Sizzle, krackle, ktczzzz.. 
Now the heat's on. Your planet's heat shield 
glows redder and redder with each Deltoid you 

Kponk. Kchungggg. Kblammm. 

If you can't get to the orbital platform to 
battle with the Deltoid armada and secure 
more defenderships, say goodbye planet. 



The Deltoid fireworks will be too much for the 
defense shields, and the planet will explode into 
another solar super nova. 

If all this sounds like fun in the sun to you, 
you're right. 

That is, of course, unless you're just a fair 
player. 

Then expect a few laser showers followed 
by a severe warming trend. 

Shoot up a storm and win a free T-shirt. 

Hit 5,000 points on Solar Storm and we'll send 
you a "Solar Storm Survivor" T-shirt. 
(See package for details.) 



SolarStorm 

For the Atari* 2600" 




*rttmrcmL* 


AFO^SQDREBOffiD 

THE BEST SCORES FOR POPULAR VIDEOGAMES 
























You does on 

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«R. BEN EFRAIM^ “PRIVATE SCHOOL" 

PHOEBE CATES BETSY RUSSELL MATTHEW MODINE MICHAELZOREK RAY WALSTON 
and SYLVIA KRISTEL as ttie Sex Teacher Written by DAN GREEN BURG a SUZAN NE O’MALLEY 
,_ PnriucaibvR BEN EFRAIM, DON ENRIG HT * NOEL BLACK ,— 1 

I Songs performed by STRAY CATS, RICK SPRINGFIELD, PHOEBE CATES and morel A U NI VERS AL^PI CTURE uviiiy 


STARTS JULY 29TH AT A THEATRE NEAR YOU 









FAVORITE GAME5 



























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VECTOR GRAPHICS 
COME HOME 

In previous issues of your magazine, 
I have read about Vector Graphics 
(V.G.). I've also played many V.G. 
games, such as: Tempest, Space Duel, 
Omega Race, Star Trek, Space Fury, 
Gravitar, and Battlezone. For some 
reason, I've liked every one of them. 

I would like to know if Atari, or any 
other company, will ever come out 
with an expandable unit for the Atari 
VCS that allows the player to play V.G. 
games. 



Ed: No. As far as we know, technical 
difficulties make it impossible to pro¬ 
duce vector graphics on any of the 
major home systems because all are 
designed to work with raster-scan 
monitors. 

Not to worry, though, because vec¬ 
tor graphics fans have a programma¬ 
ble home videogame system of their 
very own — "Vectrex". This stand¬ 
alone features its own vector graphics 
monitor and has a wide variety of 
great V.G. cartridges like Web Wars 
and Fortress of Narzod. The unit is 
priced at under $200, and is widely 
available. 


' Now that Coleco has an Atari VCS- 
adapter for the ColecoVision, I've 
heard that Mattel's Intellivision will 
soon have one as well. Could you 
confirm or deny this? 

Randy Langehenning 
Austin, TX 

Ed: You heard right, Randy! The 
Intellivision VCS emulator, known as 
"The System Changer", should be in 
the stores by the time you read this. It 
retails for approximately $75, and 
allows Intellivision owners to play 
Atari VCS-compatible game car- 


EG AND ADULT VIDEOGAMES 

I was wondering if you could tell me 
what company makes adult-oriented 
videogames. I noticed that your lists of 
different sellers has dropped off. The 
ones that are listed do not carry the 
adult games. 

William C. May 
Hayward, CA 


Ed: We at EG don't object to the 
existence of adult-themed video- 
games. Because a number of our 
readers fall into the under-18 age 
category, we feel this magazine is not 
an appropriate place to cover games 
featuring a strong emphasis on sex or 
excessive violence. Hence, we don't 
devote editorial space or seek adver¬ 
tising pages to adult-themed games. 
To find them, just keep checking out 
your local stores. 


ABOUT THE AQUARIUS 

I am an Intellivision owner. I saw an 
advertisement for a home computer 
system called the Aquarius, that's 
made by Mattel. Is this the keyboard 
component for Intellivision? If so, 
what are the Mini Expander and the 
Printer? One more question: What 
would be some of the software for the 
Aquarius? 

Kenny Creamer 



ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS 


Ed: The Aquarius is Mattel's entry 
into the computer market. Although 
it's not compatible with any existing 














Intellivision software, many of Mat¬ 
tel's most popular games will be 
adapted to run on the new computer. 
Scheduled for release are Burgertime, 
Tron Deadly Disc, and Advanced 
Dungeons & Dragons, to name just a 
few. 

As for the peripherals — both the 
Mini Expander (a memory enhancer) 
and the Printer (which allows you to 
save programs on paper) are compati¬ 
ble with the Aquarius, not the Intel- 

C.E.S. NOT MEANT 
FOR CONSUMERS 

I have an idea that I think would not 
only be a great contribution to your 
magazine, but would be a very in¬ 
teresting piece for your readers who 
never had the opportunity to visit a 
Consumer Electronics Show extrava¬ 
ganza. How about, in addition to your 
regular columns, you devote the rest 
of the issue to a photo story of the 
C.E.S.? 

Ed Doura, Jr. 

Address unknown 



Ed: The Consumer Electronics 
Show is an industry event which is not 
open to the general public. It is mostly 
concerned with the sales and market¬ 
ing of electronics merchandise, so 
much of what goes on in there is only 
of marginal interest to most readers. 
We prefer to take our impressions of 
the show, add exclusive information 
which many manufacturers supply 
only to EC, and distill the whole thing 
down to a comprehensive overview of 
what's coming next for gamers. The 
size and shape of a software pub¬ 
lisher's sales booth is, after all, a lot 
less interesting than details about the 
new games being shown there. 



GLITCH OF THE MONTH 

Imagic's Dragonfire contains a se¬ 
cret version of the game. By turning 
the game system on and off very fast 
about seven or eight times, you'll find 
a strange pattern on-screen; a black 
screen with a row of nine diamonds on 
the far left side, and the prince running 
toward the top of the screen. When 
you see this, hit the reset button. 

A screen that looks similar to the 
normal screen will appear, but once 
you get inside the castle you'll find the 
glitch. There will be a dragon at the 
bottom of the screen as usual, but on 
the left side of the screen there are 
nine treasures, all the same type, lined 
up in a row. This version of the game 
will last until the power is turned off, 
and it can even be set for different 
game selections. 

Chris Goggans 
Address unknown 

CASSETTE COMPATIBILITY 

I own an Atari VCS and recently 
purchased the Arcadia Supercharger. I 
was just wondering if you could play 
cassette games meant for an Atari 
400/800 computer through the Su- 

Cauy Duca 
Cawker City, KS 

Ed: No. In fact, the only games you 
can play through your Supercharger 
are —• surprise! — Supercharger-com¬ 
patible games. 

ONE FROM THE HEART 

I am so thrilled with your magazine. 
When I became ill and was put in a 
body cast for three months, my 70- 
year-old uncle went out and bought 


me one of the first Atari consoles and 
about 25 cartridges. 

I have the use of one arm, hand, 
shoulder (left), and I cannot sit, stand 
or walk, having had 20 operations on 
my spine and shoulder. The games 
have helped me keep from getting 
depressed, going crazy, etc. 

May God bless all of you. I just can't 
stop reading EG! P.S., how can I find 
the easiest-moving controllers? 

New Orleans, LA 
Ed: It sounds like you want a top- 
mounted firing button like the one 
found on the Pointmaster joystick. 
The deluxe version has a suctioned 



Ed: Not a bad bunch of helpful 
hints. Keep those cards and letters 
coming, folks! Q 















Calculat 


Ready to i 


nervously, ready ■ 
Cannon. 










: blanketing fog It's a battle against time. And Robot Tank™ from Alan tv 
rain obliterates against all odds. designer of Starmaster.' 

amage Control gut you must go on. Because there’s Atari" 2600“ 
pplinghit. no escape from Robot Tank’s re- ■ . For use 

lentless pursuit. *cIM3or H ?6oo“ 












MfliVisioN 
























2049er Story 

PUBLISHED HOME-VIDEOGAME YET! * 



The MINER 2049er Story 

IT'STIME TO DIGTHE MOST WIDELY PUBLISHED HOME-VIDEOGAME YET! * 

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know 
About 'Miner 2049er' 


























































m i 

THE 

MIHES 

WITH 

Bourn 

BOB 


Strategy hint: Again, move 

right. It is possible to cross the 
top platform from left to right 
and then simply drop off the 
right edge onto the ledge be¬ 
low. Also, when everything 

transporter platforms have 
been cleared, take the third 
floor before the second on all 
versions requiring time for the 
transporters to re-energize. It 
takes longer to clear the third 
platform, so no time will be 
wasted waiting for the trans¬ 
porters to "power up" 

LEVEL FOUR 

Officially dubbed the “Lil- 
lipads" level (because of all 
the hopping about that's re¬ 
quired), playfield four is a real 
test of Bounty Bob's rabbit¬ 
like leaping ability. In other 
words, this round is sure to 
keep your RCMP hopping ! 

After scaling the enormous 
ladder on the left side of the 
screen, it's off to the races as 
you struggle to work out the 
basis of a viable pattern. As 
with most of these scenarios, 
start at the left side, scale the 
ladder, then begin leaping to¬ 
ward the flower pot. Finish off 
that side of the playfield, and 
jump on the mutants on the 
right side. Head back down- 
screen on the right side before 
returning to the top to take 
out the final mutants and 
move down a level for the 
double-jump finale! 

Strategy hint: Whenever 
attempting to take out the 
top-level mutants, wait until 

has moved to dead center and 


Vault the turning mutant and 
race forthe candle, grab it and 
eliminate the left mutant. 
Then hurry back and take out 
the other nasty with a mighty 


LEVEL FIVE 

Dubbed "Advanced Lilli- 
pads", it is essentially a more 
challenging version of the 
previous scenario. On this 
level, Bob meets his first lethal 

ni at the lower left of the 
playfield. 

There are at least three dis¬ 
tinct strategic approaches to 
this phase, but the key to suc¬ 
cess lies in Bob's ability to 
reach the top shaft and clear it 
of mutants while claiming the 
territory. The top level, you 
see, is riddled with chutes, and 
you will need some fancy 
joysticking to keep from 
tumbling down one of the 
seven slides. The optimum 
tactic involves clearing every¬ 
thing but the center slide entr¬ 
ance, then dropping straight 
down, claiming not only the 
top shaft but all the territory 
Bob covers on the way down. 

For real daredevils, there's a 
floating platform way up in 

leap in hopes of claiming the 
game's most gorgeous bonus 
object — a glittering rande- 

would covet! 

Strategy hint^Making^pre- 

when moving up the parallel 
ledges on the upper left por¬ 
tion of the playfield, time your 
jump so that you not only take 
out the ledge-lurking mutant, 
but the rover at the left side of 
the top shaft as well. 


LEVEL SIX 

This is a truly hazardous 
scenario, entitled the "Radio¬ 
active Wastes" level. A gigan¬ 
tic tank of deadly waste pro¬ 
ducts from an old uranium 
mine fills almost the entire 
bottom fourth of the playfield. 
Bob must tiptoe oh-so-care- 
fully around the ledges and 
time jumps so as not to come 
face-to-fang with a prowling 


duces a horrifying sizzle you'll 
never forget! 

Strategy hint: Have a friend 
who's very, very, good at 
videogames play this round 
for you. Seriously, make only 
the surest jumps, and keep a 
tight grip on your joystick — 
you don't want your RCMP 
strolling over the edge of a 
ledge! 



network of chutes is added to 


a criss-crossing playfield lay¬ 
out that includes four eleva¬ 
tor/transporters at the left 
edge of the screen. 

Some fascinating new 
bonus objects turn up here, 
including goggles, drills, flat¬ 
irons and even a dynamite 
detonator! The roughest part 
of this level is avoiding the 

Watch your step, and Bob 
may get his man after all! 

Strategy hint: When taking 
the elevator to the fourth 
level, be sure not to position 
Bob dead center (wherever 
Bob is placed in his departing 
transporter, he turns up at his 
destination), as a chute will be 











Computer Club 2000" 

It’s like getting a computer 


mu 






































It's very straightforward, ex¬ 
cept for the horizontally-slid- 
ing hydraulic scaffold. In the 


ix lurking must make his way back to the 


Finally, there are the pul¬ 
verizers. After each successful 
ledge-clearing, Bob slides to 
the bottom of the field, faces 


lift. The player can then slide 
the scaffold back and forth 
along its track and elevate the 
accordian-like "legs" to reach 
the hanging ladder, or second 
level from the top. 

Strategy hint: When taking 
out a mutant who is closing in 

hit a bonus object, jump! By 
leaping into the air, Bob first 
strikes the bonus object, mak- by. 
ing the mutant instantly 
vulnerable. 


LEVEL NINE 

Besting "The Pulverizers" is LEVEL TEN 
actually an enjoyable, and not Are you ready for.. 


ige through the pulverizers, 
lashing down, then move 


tally-sliding track and can be 
used to gain access to both the 
left and right shafts. 

Strategy hint: Timing must 

avoid landing on a level j ust as 
its roving mutant is making its 
way toward your spot! 


Many gamers, wh 
ing on the first lev 
trouble in clearing thi 






























CREATIVE SOFTWARE 

- the # 1 * independent VIC-20 full-line software 
publisher in the U.S. - is proud to announce 



4 new Game Cartridges & 5 Home Applications 
for the COMMODORE 64. 


yjSTROEyrz. 


^■CREATIVE 
^|| SOFTWARE 

SunrJv2^CA94086 ^ 


♦Based on survey of distributors and retailers. 
Copyright 1983 by Creative Software. All rights reserved. 

1 "COMMODORE 64" 


These Home Appli¬ 
cation Programs 
are also available 
for the VIC-20. 

























































































_ wi c a _ 

COMMAND 

CONTROL 


The Authentic Arcade Trackball: 


degrees to the right - y im/iruHiciii computer technology 

has a meaning all its own. atSKSK 

movement on the screen. Spin our phenolic ball has its own custom microprocessor built in. So 

2 revolutions per second — and you'll get that it can talk to your system in a language all its own. 

exact same speed on the screen. Only WICO It responds as fast as your hand reacts — and as 

gives you high resolution positioning with the accurately. You’ll notice a difference the first 

ultimate in speed control. That’s why only time you play. 

WICO trackballs can give you higher scores on The WICO Command Control Trackball works 

games like Demon Attack" Missile Command,’ with Atari, CommodoreVIC-20 and 8 other pop- 

Centipede," Space Invaders" and many more. ular video game and home computer systems. 

We created the WICO trackball to make the And it has a full one year limited war- 

good player even better. To give you a ranty. It’s made and backed by 



dnd of excitement, the arcade 


WICO - the san 
that makes 


: company 


excitement i 




































































Go Underground with Bounty Bob! 


MINER 2049er 

Big Five/Atari 400-800-1200 
16K cartridge 

In Miner 2049er you play Bounty 
Bob, the worker who must safely in¬ 
spect 10 levels of an underground 
mine while avoiding various deadly 
plasma creatures. Bounty Bob moves 
along the mine floors, "inspecting", 
until he runs over every section on the 
screen. He may jump over holes or 


By FRANK TETRO JR. 

creatures, but Bob must be careful, 
because he can only survive a fall the 
length of one body. 

Along the different stations of the 
mine are scattered several objects left 
by past miners. If Bounty Bob touches 
one, he earns a bonus, and the plasma 
creatures smile and turn green with 
envy, at which time Bob may eat them 
for extra time. The bonus indicator at 
the top of the screen counts down 


while Bob attempts to complete his 
mission. Should the counter ever reach 
zero, Bob's oxygen supply will termi¬ 
nate, and he'll melt away. 

Each screen of Miner requires a 
different strategy, so let's examine 
them one at a time. 

The first field features nothing but 
girders and ladders. Bob "paints" 
these girders while avoiding the plas¬ 
ma creatures. Once the action starts 















Introducing. 



















and you jump onto the first girder, 
notice that the only way to get the 
bottom creature is to move up, snag 
the bonus prize, and come back down. 
This is tempting, but it takes too much 
bonus time, and isn't worth the effort. 
Once you get up midway, simply 
touch a prize and eliminate the crea¬ 
tures immediately before you finish 

The second level adds a new twist— 
chutes, which slide you off a level onto 
the next often against your will. The 
toughest part of this station is to paint 
over the chutes without accidentally 
falling down them. To do this, simply 
paint one block from one side, jump 
the chute and paint the other from the 
other side. Remember to eliminate the 
creatures first, because you may 
accidentally jump up and hit one. 

The third level features transporters 
which "beam" Bounty Bob to another 
section of the mine. Once they are 
used, they need five seconds to 
recharge before they will function 
again. At this station, it is tempting to 
jump from the edge onto the trans¬ 
porter shafts. Although this jump 
looks easy, it is impossible, because it 
measures a little more than one body- 
length. Don't be afraid to use the 
transporters. 

Once the arcader hits level four, it's 
the big time. This station of the mine is 
filled with little girders arranged in a 
stair-like fashion, 

I find it best to head up the right side 
of the screen and then back down on 
the left. On this field, it is important to 
hit the bonus prize and immediately go 
for the closest creature. The only real 
way to master this screen is to master 
the jumping technique. The only other 
trick is getting to the little platform 



which is located at center screen, right 
under the long top girder. Save it for 
last, and then jump from the platform 
which is to the left of it. This jump 
appears to be too long; however, if 
Bounty jumps at the last second, he'll 
make it easily. 

The fifth screen is similar to the 
fourth, in that there is a plethora of 
platforms. However, this screen also 
features the slides from screen two 
plus a new device — sliding platforms 
which Bob may ride to get from place 
to place. Jumping on these moving 
platforms requires timing and a lot of 
practice. If Bob misses the platform, he 
plummets to his death. It's best to 
head up the left side, then go across 
the top, watching those slides and 
creatures, and finally, down the right 
side by falling from platform to plat- 

The sixth screen also features plat¬ 
forms which must be jumped, as well 
as a moving girder similar to the one 
on screen five. The new twist is that 
the platforms are placed so far apart 
that if Bob doesn't jump at the last 
possible second (i.e., one foot on, one 
off), he drops into the bucket of 
radioactive waste situated at the bot¬ 
tom of the screen. This station is also 
set up in such a way that Bob must 
save the lower right corner for last. 


This is because once you make the 
jump to these three bottom girders to 
paint them, there is no way back up. 
So remember, claim them last! The 
other trouble spot in this screen is the 
group of girders located all the way in 
the upper left-hand corner of the 
screen — and beyond the range of 
Bob's jumping capability. There is only 
one way to get to these; Bob must 
jump onto the moving platform which 
slowly traverses the entire screen, ride 
it across and jump off onto these 
girders. Once the girders are painted, 
he must wait for the platform's return 
and time the jump exactly to the 
moving platform. 

The seventh screen of Miner2049er 
is considered one of the toughest 
boards of all. This one has all the 
features of the previous stations. 

It is very difficult to master. The best 
strategy is to analyze all your know¬ 
ledge of how these different objects 
function, and use ittoyouradvantage. 
On this playfield, you will probably 
slide down the chutes a lot more than 
you like. This is normal, and you can 
overcome it with practice. Just re¬ 
member to paint half the slide from the 
left, jump over it, and paint the other 
half from the right. The other trick for 
this station is how to rid Bob of the 
organism located at top center screen 
because there are no treasures nearby 

All that is in sight are the letters "BF” 
(the initials stand for "Big Five") lo¬ 
cated over the organism's head. These 
letters, however, are Bob's key to 
victory. When Bob gets over the 
organism by riding a platform, jump 
straight up and hit the "BF”. This earns 
Bob plenty of bonus points, and turns 
the monster green just as Bob lands on 












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the girder, probably right on top of 
him. Once on this girder, the only way 
off is to jump back on the moving 
platform when it comes by again. 

The eighth screen is not all that 
tough, but it is definitely one of the 
cutest scenarios in the game. This level 
is mainly girders, ladders and slides 
(which Bob should have mastered by 
now), but there is another device 
which Bob must use to complete the 
field. This is a white scaffold-like de¬ 
vice which Bob activates by jumping 
onto it and pushing the space bar on 
the computer. The joystick then con¬ 
trols the scaffold until the space bar is 
pushed again. The problem with this 
level is that Bob must go to each 
platform separately by using the scaf¬ 
fold. 

This poses a problem if the scaffold 
is located next to a girder and Bob 
accidentally falls down a slide to the 
platform below. At this point, Bob is 
stranded because the scaffold is up at 
the next platform and, unfortunately, 
slides go only one way: down. 

Station nine is very tricky — and 
sometimes monotonous — for Bob to 
complete. The screen is filled with 
short platforms, one on top of the 
other, located at both the left and right 
portions of the screen. The right set 
is connected by ladders and is easily 
painted. The left set's not connected 
and must be gotten one at a time. This 
is done by falling onto a platform 
located just below each of the right 
side girders. Once Bob lands on one of 
these platforms, it shoots across the 
screen toward the left platform on the 
same level. Bob must jump to the left 
just as the platform is about to strike its 
target or the concussion knocks our 
mounty off the perch, after which he 



slides down the huge vertical chute all 
the way to the bottom. 

That's not all, however. To walk 
across the bottom back at the left to 
try again, Bob must maneuver under 
five synchronized pulverizers! This 
process is time-consuming, because 
Bob must paint one girder, fall down 
the slide, walk back to the right side, 
climb up to the next platform, ride it 
across, paint that level, fall, and so on, 
until all platforms are covered. The 
trickiest part of level nine is mastering 
the jump, which must be done right 
before the impact of the moving girder 
with the left-most platform occurs. 

Before Bob starts riding platforms, 
he should first go to the bottom near 
the pulverizers, where an alien organ¬ 
ism is patrolling. Bob should then hit 
the bonus prize located next to the 
right entrance to the pulverizers, sneak 
under the pulverizers and kill this 
organism before starting the moving 
platform maneuvers. There is also 
another organism roving the bottom 
of the huge vertical slide. He isn't that 
dangerous, though, because once you 
paint a left girder and slide down the 
slide, Bob is usually still powered due 
to hitting the bonus prize while on the 
moving platform. 

The final challenge is probably the 
most fun, but not necessarily the most 


difficult. This scenario features a can¬ 
non which the player must maneuver 
under a girder in order to shoot Bob up 
to a level where he must paint, fall 
down a slide, avoid organisms, reload 
the cannon, and start again on another 
level. There are six platforms, three on 
each side of the screen, for Bob to 
paint, each patrolled by mutants 
which cannot be killed because there 
are no bonus prizes! 

Bounty Bob must go to the store¬ 
house and get enough explosives to 
blow him to the desired ramp. It takes 
100 tons of explosives per level to 
activate the cannon. If Bob takes more 
than 300 it blows him right off the 
screen! The best strategy for this play- 
field is to master the use of the cannon 
in avoiding organisms. If Bob touches 
an organism on his way up, or while 
sliding back down, it spells death. 

Learn to fire Bob skyward when all 
the organisms are on the other side. 
This gives him time to land safely. 
Once there, Bob can jump the organ¬ 
ism if necessary to complete the plat¬ 
form. Then, when sliding down, make 
sure the slide is clear of mutants to 
assure a safe fall. Paint the six plat¬ 
forms first, then go back to the ware¬ 
house and finish it off by hitting the 
rest of the TNT. If Bob hits these before 
completing the platforms, he will have 
too much TNT, and the cannon will 
send him to the moon!!! 

Miner 2049er is a varied game 
which requires many skills and lots of 
practice. Learn the different objects 
and what they do so Bounty Bob can 
use them to his advantage. With a little 
patience and plenty of practice, you'll 
have Bob flying through the mine with 
ease so he can get his inspection done 
and see his "darling Clementine". G 













Introducing 
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The crunch will drive you ape! 

If you like playing Donkey Kong, taste. So invite your favorite gorill 
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new Donkey Kong Cereal! into new Donkey Kong 

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ifci 






THE SUMMER GAME GOES 


BtEGH 


A Season of Video 
and Computer Basebal Games 


f or true diamond devotees, baseball 
is a year-'round sport. Though the 
excitement of the current season's 
pennant races may dim the memories 
of fans, the national pastime doesn't 
quite vanish in a cloud of dust im¬ 
mediately following the final game of 
the World Series. 

It just goes a bit underground. Win¬ 
ter is the time of year for that vener¬ 
able tradition of baseball, the so-called 
Hot Stove League. While the previous 
year's ballfield heroes make the 
celebrity banquet circuit, and the guys 
who booted one in the bottom " 


fishing resorts, baseball 
busily churns out tons or stories ae- 
signed to fan the flames of fan-interest 
during the cold weather. 

Because of the way business is 
transacted by the electronic gaming 
industry, the Hot Stove League period 
generally brings more electronic base¬ 
ball news than the April-October 

athletes perform. That's when the 
manufacturers of videogame 
and computer software un¬ 
veil most of their new titles, 


including the baseball programs. 

In truth, the winters of 1980-1981 
and 1981-1982 provided little in the 
way of good news for baseball-loving 
arcaders. Each of the major home 
programmable systems at that time— 
Atari 2600, Mattel Intellivision, Odys¬ 
sey Odyssey 2 and Astrocade Astro- 
cade—already had a baseball cartridge 
in its library. Ironically, the very popu¬ 
larity of baseball games has kept the 
quality of such cartridges from improv- 
ing as rapidly as, say, invasion or 
maze games over the same period. 
Each software supplier put out a base¬ 
ball title almost as soon as the system 
itself made its debut, so these pro¬ 
grams didn't benefit much from the 
improvement in programming tech¬ 
niques which help keep electronic 
gaming so exciting. 

Everything changed dramatically 
last winter. Leading software manu¬ 
facturers, including Atari, Coleco, 
Mattel and Odyssey, announced the 
pending introduction of new baseball 
cartridges. Simultaneously, things also 
heated up in the computer arena, with 
new programs already in the stores or 
poised to appear within the next few 
months. 

So, it's really a whole new ball game 
when it comes to electronic baseball 





















hit an outside curve is no more relevant 
to the course of the game than Tom 
Lasorda or Billy Martin's ability to take 

effect whatsoever. Stat games are 
targetted at home arcaders who think 
they can outdo the actual American 
and National League managers. 

THE VIDEOGAMES 

Mattel's Major League Baseball has 
dominated electronic hardball the way 
the New York Yankees once lorded it 
over the rest of the Junior Circuit. 
Already enshrined in the Electronic 
Gaming Hall of Fame, Major League 
Baseball has remained one of the 20 
most popular videogames since its 
publication in 1980 as one of the first 
Intellivision cartridges. 

The manager in the field uses the 
direction disc to pitch. Pressing the 
segment which corresponds to 12:00 
fires a fastball, while holding down 
6:00 causes the hurler to toss a lazy 
change-up. Pushing the appropriate 
portion of the direction disc can also 
generate inside and outside curves. 

The action buttons govern the bat¬ 
ter's swing. One stud makes him bring 
the bat around all the way, and the 
other prompts the man at the plate to 
drop a bunt. Since all batted balls are 
treated as grounders, the manager on 
defense must use the keypad to con¬ 
trol the fielders and get the ball to first 
base in time to retire the hitter. A 
fielder is activated by pressing the 
portion of the keypad correspond¬ 
ing to his fielding position, and then 
using the direction disc to move the 
man around the field. 

Major League Baseball has one of 

running game found in any baseball 



cartridge. The direction disc governs 

indicate his special status). Pushing the 
right edge of the metallic circle causes 

extra base on a good hit. You can even 



flash the "steal" sign, but the other 
team's catch may cut down your man 
with a good peg to the waiting fielder. 

Apart from a few minor rough spots, 
Major League Baseball contains few 
defects. The only limitation of any 
significance is that the cartridge re¬ 
quires two human managers, since the 
program itself can't manage one of the 

Major League All Star Baseball 

eliminates this drawback by allowing 
for solitaire play. No longer must an 
avid baseball gamer hunt up a patsy in 
order to play the Intellivision rendition 
of the national pastime. The cartridge, 
expected during the second half of 
1983, promises to include other refine¬ 
ments, which should only go to make 
this revamped program even greater. 

Another new Mattel baseball car¬ 
tridge, this one designed for use with 
its Entertainment Computer System, is 
World Series Baseball. Rather than 
providing a straight overhead 
visualization of the action, this pro¬ 
gram shows the field as a camera in the 
pressbox would catch it. The display 
can pan across the entire diamond, 
and it's even possible to keep an eye 
on a base runner with a split screen 
arrangement. 

World Series Baseball is noteworthy 
for another reason; it's the first statisti¬ 
cal replay game designed for any 
videogame system. You can program 
in batting and pitching records of 
actual past and present players, and 
then find out how Steve Carlton would 
do against the 1927 Yankees' "Mur¬ 
derers Row" of sluggers. 

Atari's baseball story is more like one 
of those old Charles Atlas ads than the 
athletic exploits of such as Frank Mer- 
riwell, who starred in innumerable 













Introducing the only way to play 
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Join GameLine. For just $59.95* plus a $15 one¬ 
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instructions; full-color poster. And more. 


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It’s easy. Just insert the 
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COMPUTER BASEBALL 


Computer Baseball, from Strategic 
Simulations for the Apple II, is a statis¬ 
tical replay baseball program that still 
rates as tire class of the league. As it 
comes from the manufacturer, Com¬ 
puter Baseball features the rosters of 
the teams that participated in the 13 
greatest match-ups in World Series 
history. Update disks covering the 
1980 and 1981 baseball seasons are 
available from SSI. For $60, CB Enter¬ 
prises (58A St. Lo Road, Fort Lee, VA, 
23801) will sell you a five-disk set 
containing 305 computer baseball 
teams. These disks contain every pen¬ 
nant and division winner from 1900 to 
1979 as well as such interesting clubs 
as the 1962 Mets and the 1941 Red 
Sox. 

Each manager creates a line-up 
from the team's full roster as shown on 
the screen. As the skipper, you'll have 
to take account of things such as: how 
tired your proposed starting pitcher 
might be (based on how recently he 
last toiled), running speed and fielding 

Computer Baseball is probably most 
enjoyable when played head-to-head 
with two human managers, but the 
program's robot field general, 
"Casey", will only outrage your 
strategic sensibilities from time to 
time. Even though manual dexterity 
isn't a factor, don't worry about hav¬ 
ing enough to do. On both offense 
and defense, there's plenty to do. For 
instance, this is the only stat replay 
baseball game, electronic or non-elec- 
tronic, that requires a relief pitcher to 
warm up before entering the game. 
This adds a highly realistic feel to 
handling the pitching, since the man¬ 
ager can't just shuttle hurlers in and 



out of the game with no advance 
thought or planning. 

Computer Baseball is only available 
for the Apple II currently. Hopefully, 
SSI will heed the pleas of Atari and 
Commodore 64 owners and produce 
editions of this 1982 Arcade Award 
winner for those systems as well. 

Avalon Hill's Major League Base¬ 
ball, previously available only for the 



TRS-80 has been yanked from the 
market. That's the bad news. The 
good news is that this statistical replay 
program, enhanced with better 
graphics and other attractive features, 


will soon be revised and re-published 
for several of the popular systems. 
Avalon Hill has lots of sports game 
know-how, so this should be an im¬ 
portant event on the baseball gaming 
calendar. 

And speaking of baseball game 
know-how, APBA (the firm that prac¬ 
tically invented stat replay games) is 
now mulling the possibility of invading 
the computer field with an electronic 
version of its hugely successful table- 
top non-electronic baseball simula¬ 
tion. No concrete details yet, but you 
can expect the Lancaster, PA game- 
maker to pull out all the stops if this 
project gets the green light. 

Atari computer owners haven't 
been forgotten, either. Gamestar, 
which has already given us Baja Bug¬ 
gies and Starbowl Football intends to 
produce a baseball title in the near 
future. It is expected to be a 16K 
program, so those who own standard- 
issue Atari 400 machines won't be left 
out in the cold. According to Game- 
star's president, Scott Orr, the as-yet- 
untitled game will be an arcade-style 
action presentation. If it's going to be 
as good as the publisher's first pair of 
entries, it ought to be a prize rookie 
later in 1983. 

So the next time your favorite teams 
are rained out of a Sunday double- 
header, don't despair. There's authen¬ 
tic baseball action as close as the 
nearest home arcade machine. 

•••SPORTS FANS!*** 

Soon lovers of electronic sports 
games will have a column of their own 
in EG. Watch for the debut of "The 
Electronic Pressbox” later this year. 
Your coach will be reknowned com- 
puterist Leigh Goldstein. G 


















Now Available. 



THE ENCYCLOPEDIA YOU'VE 
EN WAITING FOR! 


We've sot them all! 
Comprehensive 
descriptions and ratinss, 
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stratesy, for 
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All the major game 
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to Zaxxon. . .from Atari 
to the Vic-20. 


This one-of-a-kind 
catalog tells you 
exactly what’s available 
for your favorite hobby. 
Up to the minute.. .and, 
of course, up to the 
high standards of 
ELECTRONIC GAMES 
Magazine. . .it’s a 
must-have reference 
guide for all 
avid arcaders and 
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The ELECTRONIC GAMES 1983 SOFTWARE ENCYCLOPEDIA 


gives you 

All the home videogames 
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for easy reference 


1983 Software Encyclopedia 
ELECTRONIC GAMES Magazine 
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New York, New York 10001 



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1983 SOFTWARE 
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ildushroom Hunting with Centipede! 



Publication of this cartridge means 
there's now a home version of Cen¬ 
tipede for all three Atari hardware 
systems — 2600, 5200 and 400-800- 
1200 computers. Obviously, the 2600 
edition's graphics can’t hold a candle 
to the visual delights of the two home 
cartridges, much less the lushly color¬ 
ful coin-op that started the whole 
thing a couple of years ago. What 
makes this Centipede so great, 
though, is the way the anonymous 
designer has captured the essence of 
the game's play mechanic. It looks 
enough like previous versions of Cen¬ 


tipede to satisfy most home arcaders, 
and the play-action is true-blue to the 
original design. 

The magic wand at the bottom of 



CENTIPEDE 


the playfield is the only power strong 
enough to destroy the centipedes, 
spiders, fleas and scorpions that are 
invading the elves' mushroom garden. 
The player starts with a supply of three 
such wands, available one at a time as 
the previous one is destroyed by con¬ 
tact with one of the invading nasties. 
Unlike most invasion games, Cen¬ 
tipede grants the player the ability to 
move the wand about one-third of the 
way up the field as well as from side to 
side. The cartridge is fun with the 
joystick, but might well be even better 
with Atari's new tracball controller. 

A centipede composed of nine body 
segments enters the field at the top 











from the top of the screen after the 
playfield becomes too cleared of 
mushrooms, creating new ones as it 
falls. The scorpion makes its debut 
after the arcader dispatches three 
Centipede screens. It runs across the 
field, poisoning all the mushrooms. If 
it's hit before it completes a whole 
row, however, the spell of the poison is 
broken and it ceases to have effect. 

What do you get when you take 
most of the cute out of a cute game? If 
the game in question is Centipede, the 
answer is that you get a rip-snorting 
action shoot that belongs in every 
2600 owner's software collection. 


POLARIS 

Tigeivision/Atari 2600 

Okay, let's see some hands on this 
one: How many of you remember the 
Taito coin-op Polaris? A classic arcade 
action contest that dates back some 
five years, it still turns up in small 
arcades and candy stores around the 
country today. Now, at long last, 
Tigervision has produced a first-rate 
home version of this coin-op staple. 

Polaris inspired virtually all of the 
early home videogame cartridges 
based on air-sea combat. The initial 
scenario takes the gamer, as Captain 


and progresses down the screen to¬ 
ward the player's position. If the player 
hits a body segment with a blast from 
the wand, it turns into a mushroom 
and the section immediately behind it 
transforms into a new head. The insect 
disappears briefly when every seg¬ 
ment is destroyed, but then starts a 
new journey down the playfield. The 
centipedes attack in waves, each 
featuring more head and fewer body 
segments than the one which pre¬ 
ceded it. 

Eliminating a mushroom — which 
takes three hits — scores fewer points 
than leaving it on-screen until the 
end of the round when the program 
counts up the bonus points. Every 
mushroom still on the field at that 
point is worth five points, versus one 
point each for those which the player 
has uprooted. 

So why shoot a mushroom? The 
reason is simple; it's the mushrooms 
that determine the path the centipede 
takes. The insect moves along hori¬ 
zontally until it runs into a mushroom, 
then drops down one row. If you can 
get the mushrooms arranged just right 


on the screen, it will guide the cen¬ 
tipede into positions in which it is 
vulnerable to your wand fire. 

The spider is essentially a nuisance. 
It hops across the screen devouring 
mushrooms and menacing the wand. 
The closer the arachnid is to the wand 
when you blast it, the more points it is 
worth. The flea drops straight down 










of the atomic submarine "Polaris", on 
a jaunt into heavily-patrolled enemy 
seas. Hostile submarines prowl be¬ 
neath the waves while high-altitude 
bombers drop depth charges from 

The Polaris, of course, is hardly 
defenseless. Vertically launched mis¬ 
siles can take down a plane, while 
horizontally-fired torpedoes are more 
than adequate for dealing with hostile 
subs. It's even possible to draw a 
bomber’s attention, then dart beneath 
an enemy submarine, letting your foes 
destroy one another. 

The second rack poses a similar 
challenge, but adds an additional 
wrinkle. The planes execute dive 
bombing runs, arcing downward in 
deadly loop-de-loops until they are 
practically kissing the surface of the 

The third screen offers the most 
challenging mission. The playfield 
shifts to an overview. Players must 
now navigate the Polaris through a 
labyrinth of undersea caves bristling 
with drifting subsea mines. 

Tactically, Polaris is the sort of 
open-ended contest that allows for an 
encyclopedia of strategies. Some play¬ 
ers like to lurk near the surface during 
the first two racks, in hopes of getting 
a better shot at the overhead bombers, 
while others hang low in the water in 
hopes of the enemy taking out its own 
submarines. 

True, the game play is a trifle dated, 
but the graphics are fine, the sound 


effects excellent, and as a straight-out 
arcade combat blast-'em-up, Polaris 
merits near classic status. 

SPACE FURY 

Coleco/ColecoVision 

When Sega's Space Fury first burst 
on the arcade scene, it created a flurry 
of excitement as one of the first talking 
videogames. With two bits sitting 
comfortably in its belly, a cydopian 
space villain shimmered into view, a 
nasty smirk on his oversized head. 
"Ah," he intoned with obvious relish, 
"a creature for my amusement!" 

The alien from Space Fury quickly 
became a favorite among arcaders, 
who especially enjoyed his closing 
commentary on their technique. De¬ 


pending upon the player's score, the 
alien rated you as anything from a 
poor to an outstanding opponent. 

The game itself, however, was 
largely a technological marvel. It intro¬ 
duced color vector graphics as well as 
speech. The action, unfortunately, was 
a rather tired Asteroids take-off with 
bonus docking sequences added be¬ 
tween waves for variety. 

ColecoVision's home version makes 
for an interesting disappointment. The 
graphics are superb, even more spec¬ 
tacular in raster than the original's 
vector graphics (demonstrating rather 
pointedly why there are so few new 
vector coin-ops). The chatty space 
gladiator, however, is either captioned 
with moving lips or I'm going deaf. The 
ColecoVision does provide excellent 
musical accompaniment, but the un¬ 
spoken challenge carries none of the 
bravado that made the original such a 

The left trigger activates the ship's 
thrust while the one on the right fires 
the laser cannon(s). Initially, a front- 
mounted cannon fires single bursts, 













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The world’s hottest hotline, for Vidkids only 





their waiting arms. 
Once docked, each of 
cannons possess some 
form of technological magic. One fires 
tri-directionally, another launches 
double-barreled blasts and the third 
uses a criss-cross pattern. The final 
docking is permanent, so save your 
favorite cannons for last. 

Unfortunately, this bonus element 
gives Space Fury problems. For one 
thing, it actually takes work to avoid 
capturing these cannons. Since the 
gamer need only fly straight up, left i 
right, the challenge i: 
hardly a demanding 
process. More sig¬ 
nificantly, this ele¬ 
ment makes Space 
a true freak 


vorites in Megamania, the sad saga of 
a space pilot's post-pizza nightmares. 
Now we have Plaque Attack, a sort of 
Missile Command with sugar instead 
of smart bombs. 

Is this man obsessed with food? 

Well, you’d never know it to look at 
him. A thin, handsome young man, 
Cartwright seems a most unlikely 
apostle of videogame gluttony, but he 
has put more food on TV screens in the 
past six months than Julia Child. 

Plaque Attack features a playfield 
that looks like an open mouth with sets 
of upper and lower teeth occupying 
the top and bottom of the screen. The 
player must protect these choppers 
from the assault waves of sucrose, 
fructose and other assorted plaque- 
builders. Armed with a trusty tube of 
toothpaste, the gamer maneuvers an 
omni-directional tooth cleanser to 
shoot down the battalions of burgers, 




MM MM 

1 

¥ 


¥ 

¥ 

¥ 




french fries, cherries, candy canes and 
company attacking your toofies. 

Each time a bit of food makes con¬ 
tact with a tooth, it slightly yellows the 
enamel coating, indicating a danger¬ 
ous plaque build-up. After a few pass¬ 
es, the teeth start to fall like leaves in 
October. The player can earn bonus 
teeth by getting a high score, but once 
that last molar bites the dust, this game 


Gamers who have never 
the opportunity to see 
Steve Cartwright in person 
must imagine him as a 
veritable Haystacks Cal- 










ZERO HOUR APPROACHING! 
SKILLED REBEL PILOT NEEDED 
TO BATTLE DEATH STAR. 



FROM EMPIRE'S TIE INTERCEPTORS. 
ALSO NOTE...BE ON ALERT FOR TRACK¬ 
ING DEATH RAY 

TIME RUNNING OUT. ALL REBEL 
PILOTS REPORT IMMEDIATELY FOR 
RETURN OF THE JEDI DEATH STAR 
I BATTLE THE THRILLING HOME VIDEO 
J GAME FROM PARKER BROTHERS. 


For the Atari 2600 “ and soon available for lntellivision. fe 


MB4RKER BROTHERS 











Plaque Attack, while strictly a 
"cute" game, could be described more 
aptly as "adorable”. The graphics are 
crystal clear, bravura renditions of junk 
food on the march, attacking in groups 
of three while the gamer whirls the 
toothpaste around the playfield. As 
each wave is completed, the tube rolls 
up and is reborn with a full supply of 
white paste. 

There's one problem with Plaque 
Attack — it isn't much fun to play. 
Sure, the first few rounds will have 
gamers rolling on the floor. But once 
the graphic novelty wears off, there 
are none of the compulsive play 
mechanics found in, say, Megamania. 
The extraordinary graphics seem to be 
the whole point, rather than an en¬ 
hancement. The toothpaste is also 
rather awkward to manipulate. It 
does, however, play much more 
cleanly with a tracball controller than a 

Plaque Attack is very much like a 
pop song with an irresistible "hook" 
that knocks out the listener the first 
five times around, but sounds tired by 
the sixth. Still, you'll never see a better 
bag of french fries on the 2600! 

FLASH GORDON 

Fox Video Carnes/Atari 2600 

Whenever there’s a crying need for 
help in the world of tomorrow, folks 
can count on that knight of the 
spacelanes, Flash Gordon, to arrive in 
the nick of time to lend a hand. The 
first home arcade game to be based on 
that famous hero from comic books, 
newspaper strips, movies, television 
and radio, finds Flash facing a serious 
situation, indeed. 

The problem in this one-player, 
two-display contest is that many 
spacemen enter the maze-like streets 
of Spider City, but none ever return! 
The gamer employs the joystick to 
move Flash Gordon through the 
streets of the alien metropolis on a 
mission to rescue any survivors while 
destroying enemy warriors. 

Flash Gordon is the first 2600- 
compatible cartridge that truly inte¬ 
grates the action taking place on two 


different displays that are visible on the 
screen simultaneously. The upper half 
of the screen shows a close-up of Flash 
Gordon's rocket ship and the area 
immediately surrounding it. The lower 
portion represents an overhead view 
of the streets of Spider City. 

The city display indicates the current 
position of the rocket ship as well as 
the locations of disrupters and hatch¬ 
ing pods. The disrupters, shown on the 
map as crosses, must be watched very 
carefully. If Gordon's craft blunders 
into one, it is necessary to avoid a lot of 
space debris that starts flying around 
the screen. Shooting a disrupter's 
generator will aid the player in escap¬ 
ing by temporarily freezing the dis- 

The close-up view near the top is 
particularly useful for carrying out the 
mission's tactical moves. After moving 
through the city using the map, the 
player should concentrate on the up¬ 
per playfield when it comes time to 
pick up a surviving spaceman — or 
pick a fight with an alien patrol vessel. 

Apart from saving the spacemen, 
Flash's main goal is to eliminate the 
warriors of Spider City. This is a some¬ 
what complicated procedure. First, the 
player must guide the ship so that it 
touches a hatching pod. This activates 
the pod, causing it to release a batch of 
warriors. You must shoot as many of 
these as possible, before they can 










escape off one of the edges of the 
display. Shooting at least five warriors 
from a single hatching powers your 
shield for a brief period of time. A 
simple graphic change in the appear¬ 
ance of Gordon's rocket indicates that 
the shield is functioning. When the 
shield is on, you can run into any 
enemy to destroy it. A couple of beeps 
warn when the shield power is nearly 
used up. 

David Lubar's graphics are service¬ 
able, but it is hard to work much 
personality or atmosphere into on¬ 
screen characters in games that must 
be produced within the 2600’s 
graphics and memory limitations. 
Nonetheless, the entertaining play-ac¬ 
tion, with the constant need to switch 
attention back and forth between two 
different displays, more than makes up 
for any drabness in the visuals. 


SHARP SHOT 

Mattel/lntellivision 
Since its introduction, the In- 
teilivision has been criticized by many 
gamers as being an overly sophis¬ 
ticated system. Particularly, younger 
players have been frustrated by com¬ 
plicated instructions and keypad input. 

Sharp Shot is a laudable attempt on 
Mattel's part to produce a quartet of 



stripped-down versions of more so¬ 
phisticated game concepts. 

Football turns the gridiron sport into 
a pass-and-catch contest. The space 
game is the tactical sequence from 
Space Battle; a combat competition 
pits subs against battleships and a 
maze-chase has gamers firing arrows 
at slow moving targets within a laby¬ 
rinth. Puree' of videogame, anyone? 

Sharp Shot has its heart in the right 
place, but makes the occasional mis¬ 
take of confusing simplicity with sim¬ 
ple-mindedness. Still, this should serve 
as an interesting primer in the manip¬ 
ulation of controller/keypads. G 


















—HOME— 

flRCflDING 


H igh Tech, Inc. is as good as its 
name when it comes to providing 
coin-op entertainment to patrons of its 
Muncie, IN arcade. In fact, people who 
think home arcading and the commer¬ 
cial amusement centers are light-years 
apart will get a jolt from visiting this 
video wonderland, where four Apple II 
machines vacuum up the loose change 
just like more conventional pay-for- 
play machines. 

High Tech's novel approach to elec¬ 
tronic gaming is called the "Micro Coin 
System". It utilizes four Apple II termi¬ 
nals equipped with coin boxes to sell 
computer time, which can be used for 
playing games or a host of somewhat 
more serious applications. 

After inserting an arcade token, the 
customer gets a menu, listing the 
available choices. The system is so 
user-friendly that even those who've 
never monkeyed around with a com¬ 
puter can connect with the super 
selection of Apple II software resident 
in the system. 

High Tech chose a bus-type com¬ 
munications system for Micro Coin. 


STEPS 

OUT 

Muncie 

Arcade Installs 
Apples 
for Gaming 

By RICK TEVERBAUGH 

Utilizing one computer as the control¬ 
ler for the whole system allows each 
computer station to access the hard 
disk library directly, yet everything 
takes place under the strict supervision 
of the network controller. It polls each 
computer station for current status 


and any system requirements the user 
might require. Communication be¬ 
tween the network controller and each 
computer station is handled by the 
master control program and firm-ware 
in each computer station's access con¬ 
trol card. 

The system hardware consists of an 
Amdek Color 113-in.monitor; an Apple 
II Plus, 48K, 3.3 DOS microcomputer; 
Apple II floppy disk drive; Corvus 
Constellation network; Corvus multi¬ 
plexer and mirror restore devices; cus¬ 
tom computer console and carrel; 
Epson MX-80F/T dot matrix printer; 
network control software; network 
access control card and Panasonic 
video cassette recorder. 

The Micro Coin computer station 
consists of a carrel containing two 
consoles with a partition separating 
the users. Designers took human fac¬ 
tors into account with respect to 
keyboard and joystick height, as well 
as paddle and monitor positioning to 
make the gamer's experience as 
pleasant as possible. 

The programs offered on the system 
















































































mm: 

MGM/Ukl AMI rr 
WAGES uAuLiL 



Can Anyone 
Win the Ultimate 
Videogame? 


A s anyone who has ever watched 
an episode of "Twilight Zone" 
knows, the distinction between reality 
and fantasy is sometimes shadowy. 
When Orson Welles and the Mercury 
Theater produced the "War of the 
Worlds" radio-play in 1938, its 
documentary style convinced many 
listeners that aliens from Mars were 
actually invading Earth. 

“WarGames", a major new feature 
from MGM/UA, concerns just such a 
gray area. In brief, sophisticated 
videogames and computer games are 
coming to resemble simulations de¬ 
veloped for the United States military 
establishment to test theories of war¬ 
fare and, perhaps, even fight a real 
conflict in the unfortunate event that 

The hero of the movie is a teenage 
computer hacker. That is, a person 
whose hobby is tinkering around with 
the universe of bits and bytes. "War- 
Games" asks the provocative ques¬ 
tion: “What would happen if a dyed- 
in-the-wool electronic gamer 
accidently tapped into this nation's 
most secret communications system?" 

In real life, the U.S. government 
currently owns what may well be the 
greatest videogame on Earth. The sys¬ 
tem endlessly fights and re-fights 











































chilling fact. All computer systems 
have one thing in common: by law, 
they are linked to the Ma Bell Inter¬ 
computer Communications System. 
So the lines on which we call grandma 
are exactly the same ones that convey 
state secrets. This makes the fictional 
aspect of the story — a hacker starting 
World War III — all the more plausible 
and frightening. 

To give the film a further sense of 
reality, Parkes and Lasker set them¬ 
selves a decidedly difficult task. They 
attempted to infiltrate one of the 
country's most important military cen¬ 
ters — the North American Air De¬ 
fense Command, hidden somewhere 
inside the solid granite walls of 
Cheyenne Mountain, CO. At first, 
things went smoothly enough. The 
men saw films of the vast NORAD 
Complex. Yet, when they asked to see 
the installation first hand, the air 

Assuming roles that seemed like 
characters right out of their script, 
Parkes and Lasker became undercover 
detectives and set out to work on their 
mission: getting a tour of NORAD. 

They learned from a friend at the 
complex's L.A. headquarters that cer¬ 
tain Los Angeles civic leaders were 
scheduled for a V.I.P. tour of the 


With a little resourcefulness, and 
quite a lot of luck thrown in, they both 
managed to "piggy-back" their way 
into the blue-ribbon tour. 

Once the government discovered 
this Hollywood infiltration, the two 
found themselves sharing drinks at the 
Officer's Bar with NORAD Command- 
er-in-Chief, General Hartlinger. They 
learned that some of the key points in 
their screenplay were not only true, 
but more frightening than even they 
had imagined. NORAD and other de¬ 
fense units were under extremely 
tremendous pressure from the De¬ 
fense Department to remove human 
control over their billion-dollar com¬ 
puters. There was a shockingly high 
number of missile commanders 
already gone. He told them of an 
ongoing series of eliminations, for 
reasons ranging from psychological 
disturbances to drug abuse, from alco- 


originally told that set designers would 
be allowed to recreate key rooms and 
offices. When this proved impossible, 
everything had to be fashioned from 
the memories of Parkes and Lasker. 

During the film's early stages, one 
studio which had shown keen interest 
dropped out unexpectedly. After 
MGM/UA had brought "WarGames" 
back into production, it soon became 
apparent that neither executive pro¬ 
ducer Leonard Goldberg nor his team 
were pleased with the work of director 
Martin Brest. Trying to buy time to 
keep his writers at work on the con¬ 
tinually evolving screenplay, Goldberg 
hired director John Badham, whose 
previous credits included the recently 
completed "Blue Thunder", the Frank 
Langella version of "Dracula", and 
"Saturday Night Fever". 

"WarGames" stars young Matthew 
Broderick (son of actor James 
Broderick), Dabney Coleman and John 
Wood, and is being produced by 
Harold Schneider. Nationwide release 

For Goldberg, Parkes, and Lasker, 
it’s not just the possible commercial 
tie-ins with the computer and vid¬ 
eogame revolution that got "War 
Games" off the ground. They felt from 
the start that they were onto some¬ 
thing the public should be told. © 












What Has 

lour TV Set Done For 
You Lately? 





lisr.;: 

















scenario contest, 


there isn’t enough of a visual distinc- along corr 
Epyx/Atari 400-800-1200/16K cartridge tion between generations of flowers to Jumpman, 

' Alien Carden seems destined avoid confusion, especially during the The strongest title yet from 


to just fade away after causing barely ; 
ripple. In spite of the designers' ob¬ 
vious good intentions, the game is a bit 
muddled, especially when it comes to 
scoring, and the graphics and play I 
mechanics are likely to leave you cold. 

Alien Carden is set in the glade of 

ed with row upon row of crystallized I 
"flowers”. The gamer controls the 
movements of the Cosmic Critter, a 
cutesy-pie cross between a humming¬ 
bird and a honeybee. 

The Critter moves back and forth 
across a vertically-scrolling playfield, 
eating, stinging, or bumping into flow¬ 
ers with a number of different results. 

The flower may grow even larger; it 
could change into a new "generation" 
of flower; or it could explode, blowing 
off the part of your. Cosmic Critter that 
touched it in such an offensive man¬ 
ner. The trick is to figure out what part- 
of the critter should be used to touch 
each flower. The eventual goal is to 
create as many different generations 
of flowers as possible, then go around 
the garden eating them for extra 

This program has several particu- ! 
larly annoying facets. The most S / 
aggravating is that the gamer , if. 
cannot control the Vertical 
movement of the on-screen 
persona, in spite of the fact that 
the playfield is in a constant 
state of vertical scrolling. In fact, 
each time you "change" a flower 
by touching, biting, or stinging it, 
the Cosmic Critter's direction of 
movement is automatically reversed. 

Secondly, the graphics could be 
much more interesting. The multitude 
of excellent cartridge games on the 
market right now proves that home 
computerists don't have to give up 
graphics-quality or playability for con¬ 
venience. But the "flowers" in this gar¬ 
den look more like snowflakes, and 


play sessions. ware company at a crossroads, Jump- 

(Tracie Forman) man's most remarkable feature is that 
it doesn't resemble Miner in any way. 
Everything, from the scenario shifts to 
Epyx/Atari 400-800-1200/32K disk the play-mechanics, is original. And 

No sooner are gamers adjusting to while this may not be quite as success- 
the wonderment of Miner 2049er ful a package as the classic by Hogue, 
with its 10 different scenarios, when Jumpman is unquestionably one of the 






























Harvesting 

Game Fun 

From 

An 

Alien 

Garden! 


five most interesting computer games 
released this year. 

The gamer takes the role of Jupiter 
Jumpman, running, jumping and leap¬ 
ing through the 30 sectors of Jupiter 
Headquarters in search of bombs pre¬ 
viously planted there by the nefarious 
Alienators. Throughout the chase, the 
Alienators periodically fire bullets or 
throw other dangers his way. So, be 
watchful! Plan ahead — and beware 




= 

he 


I the menace of crumbling girders! 

The levels are presented in vertical¬ 
ly-scrolling fashion. The first scenario, 
dubbed ‘‘Easy Does It", is merely to 
show how the game is played. Except 
for the occasional Alienator gunshot, 
there are no booby traps or menaces of 
great moment lurking on this level. 
Complete the gathering of the bombs, 
I however, and the action freezes while 
the entire playfield scrolls upward. This 
next rack features enemy robots who 
patrol the corridors. These mechanoids 
I must be skirted and the bombs de- 
I fused without falling off a girder. 

As play continues, there are drop¬ 
ping bombs, rolling blocks, heat-seek¬ 
ing vampire bats and a bevy of other 
surprises. Jumpman can leap, climb 
ladders and even scamper up or down 
certain ropes strung from girders. The 
action is non-stop, with an incredible 
30 levels to continually pose new chal¬ 
lenges and new horizons. Even top 
players rarely get into the twenties, so 
what awaits at the end of the final level 
fis‘ something you must work out for 
yourself! 

The graphics on this one-to-four- 
player contest are spectacular. 
'A/hen Jumpman takes a prat¬ 
fall, he really takes a doozy! 
The poor leaper bounces off 
every girder in his path on 
the way down, and ends 
__, • up on his butt, stars encircling 
his dazed dome. (Interestingly, 
if while tumbling, Jumpman 
makes contact with a bomb, he’ll 
defuse it! Wotta guy!) 
There are four game settings. On 
the ‘‘Beginner" circuit there are eight 
yjr \ relatively easy levels; the "Interme- 
W diate" offers 10 medium difficulty 
levels (nine through 18); “Advanced" 
is good for 12 hard levels. Finally, the 
"Grand Loop" allows the gamer to 


(Will Richardson) 












































RENAISSANCE 

UMI/VIC-20/cartridge 

Whatever you call it, Renaissance 
(in this case reversi), or any of the 
other names game manufacturers 
have coined, this classic strategy game 
has appeal for both the novice and the 
master. Based on the simple premise of 
capturing pieces colored black on one 
side and white on the other by flipping 
them on a 64-square board, the con¬ 
test can be as simple or as complicated 
as the player's skills allow. 

The Renaissance cartridge by UMI 
uses the capabilities of the VIC-20 to 
produce a version with all the frills a 
player could desire. It's possible to 
have a two-player contest or to face 
the machine at any of eight settings. 
That's only the beginning of the op¬ 
tions. Get a yen to change sides, take 
back one or many moves, or ask the 
computer for a suggestion, and you 
can do so. More experienced players 
will especially like the ability to save a 


game or a position on tape. 

There are lots of small extras as well, 
like the personalization of entering 
your name, a variety of ways to restart 
a game, the choice of keyboard or 
joystick control, and a tone that 
announces the refusal of an illegal 
move. This cartridge is a winner for 
both the beginner and, especially, the 
veteran player who wants a talented 
opponent and the chance to hone his 
or her skills. 

(Charlene Komar) 


and Microsurgeon put the gamer in a 
one-on-one position with an indi¬ 
vidual patient, Epidemic puts the 
gamer in control of the world's pop¬ 
ulation. 

Meteoroids, all infected with a 
deadly alien virus, are pelting the 
Earth. From an isolated position in 
Antartica, you must launch missiles to 
knock down the meteoroids while at 
the same time using the remedies at 
your disposal to fight the virus after it 
strikes the ground. 

As with most of SSI's entries, even 
the RapidFire series, Epidemic is hard¬ 
ly an arcade shoot-em-up. 

During the first phase of a turn, the 
gamer must size up the path of the 
oncoming meteoroids, decide where 
they are likely to come down and then 
launch a rocket or pass that phase. The 
second phase gives the gamer a 
chance to look at one of the 14 world 
regions in detail and administer one of 
the 12 remedies. If an area is really past 
the cure stage, a secret password can 
enable the gamer to destroy that area 
with a nuclear device to prevent the 
spread of the disease to other areas. 

There are four skill levels. At each 
successive level the virus spreads a 
little more quickly, there are more 
meteoroids to deal with, and the gam¬ 
er's options with each turn increase. 

The first few times you play, it will 
seem that everything is going crazy, 
and there is no possible salvation. Such 
is not the case. To be successful in this 
outing, the gamer must determine for 
each area that gets infected how fast 
the spread will be: mild, serious, critical 
or pneumonic. 

Then the gamer administers the 
cure that will do the most good within 
the needed time frame. It only takes 
one game to find some genuine solace 

not only won't the disease ever reach 
pneumonic level, but the area can't be 
contaminated by meteoroid contact 
and the virus won't spread to adjoin¬ 
ing areas. 

One goal is to surround the more 
seriously infected areas by areas in the 
stasis level to contain the spread. A 
complete game lasts 15-30 turns, de- 









































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CAVERNS OF FREITAG 

Muse Software/Apple I1/48K disk 

The evil dragon Freitag has held the 
Enchanted Islands in the grip of fear for 
three generations, and it is up to the 
player to guide a Thechu warrior 
through the monster infested corridors 
of the macro-maze to a face-to- 
dragon breath confrontation with the 
Old Worm himself. The arcader’s on¬ 
screen hero has a shield, sword and 
bow. The latter allows fire at more dis¬ 
tant targets as long as the adventure 
has found or bought enough arrows. 

David Shapiro has designed what is 

Wolfenstein, a game which Caverns 
of Freitag slightly resembles. Three 
screens, each of which is reachable 
with a single push of the appropriate 
numeric key, greatly enrich the 
gaming experience. The main 
display shows an overhead view, 
in full color, of a small portion 
of the overall maze. Each 
monster's 










Star League Baseball. 

It Makes Dreams Come True 
On The Atari 400/800/1200XL 
And Commodore 64. 



If you’ve ever dreamed of becoming a major 
leaguer, your dream has just come true. Introduc- 
ing STAR LEAGUE™ BASEBALL by 
GAMESTAR. For the Atari® Home Computers 
and Commodore 64.™ 


STAR LEAGUE™ BASEBALL brings home all 
the realistic action and strategy of our national 
pastime. For starters, it offers the most lifelike 
animation ever seen in a sports game, from the 
wind-up and delivery of the pitcher to the arc (and 
shadow) of a fly ball! 


STAR LEAGUE™ BASEBALL lets you choose 
your starting team and pitcher. You can even bring 



in a “knuckleball” throwing reliever when your 
starter “tires!" 

And, of course, STAR LEAGUE™ BASEBALL 
lets you play solitaire against a hard-hitting com¬ 
puter team or a human opponent. All to the excit¬ 
ing sounds of real baseball, from the crack of the 
bat to the cheer of the crowd! 

Ask for STAR LEAGUE™ BASEBALL by 
GAMESTAR at your nearest Atari® or Com¬ 
modore dealer today and make your major 
league dream come true. Or write: GAMESTAR 
INC., 1302 State Street, Santa Barbara, CA 93101 
(805) 963-3487 for our free catalog and Tips for 
Stars #2 (for STARBOWL™ FOOTBALL owners). 


WE BRING SPORTS ALIVE. 




















DEEP TO FIND 
A MORE 
EXCITING GAME 
THAN 
MINER 2049ER." 














planetary boundaries, whatsoever. 

The Spiders themselves are, in many 
ways, the least dangerous foes, al¬ 
though certainly not to be ignored. 
As they drop toward the planet, they 

Should they reach the surface, they 
become invulnerable. The webs can be 
e the arachnids are in 
:e they hit the cr 


dirt below, tl 


>s become sc 


but most players will undoubtedly 
prefer a joystick. Bonus flies are 
awarded at 10,000 points, and point 
values increase as the waves progress. 

All in all, Peter Fokos has produced 
an exciting game, but one definitely 
designed for the veteran shoot-'em- 
up player. The novice will undoubtedly 
feel like his joystick is stuck to fly 

(Charlene Komar) 

















by DATASOFT 


I JfcrDatasoft* brings you 
POOYAN, the popular 
mm, arcade game from 
WKonami, for home com- 
"■'puters. Enjoy all the fun, 

fast action, colorful, high-res- ___ 

olution graphics and arcade- POOYAM’is a super chal- 

style play without all the lenge that will keep any expe- 

quarters. rienced gamer glued to the 

Quick reflexes and fast screen. And Datasoft*will be 
thinking will protect your help- making it available for Apple", 
less piglets in the forest valley Atari ’400/800/1200, Radio 
from a pack of vicious, hungry Shack Color, Commodore 64 
wolves who travel up and and VIC 20 computer 
down the valley clinging to systems, 
balloons and throwing objects 


Shoot your 


i chunks 


Pafaiyrftlnc. 










Here's a Real Game Doctor, Mark Blank! 

By ARNIE KATZ 


le kind 

ita on punch card 

put together a few little games for his 
„ , ownamusement.butdidnotbecomea 

)in-ops and stand-alone de- dyed-in-the-wool computerist, for the 
es we all love so dearly. Many of the simple reason that he didn't own his 

Mark's next significant brush with 


biggest names started 
fields of endeavor, only 

making a handsome living out of what the computer field 
started as a hobbyist’s interest in elec- freshman year at M.l.T. in 1972. He 
tronic gaming. - x 

b h^d B | ' 


terest slowly growing greater and 
greater. ‘‘Things were really different 
then," he points out. "My teacher 
showed me a three-foot-square cube 
near the machine one day, and I was 
really impressed that it could hold 8K 
of memory. These days, our games 
contain many times that amount of 
information." 

Although he also took a course in 
took a computer course, again involv- artificial intelligence as a junior, what 


rk Blank, the 28-year-old force ing the IBM 1130, and foundl 

ALOCKED DOOR. ADEAD MAN 

And 12 Hours to solve the murder. 



LINE 


Blank on the rc 

traveled so far, was 
landing a research 
project involving 
computers at M.I.T.. 
One project led to 
the next and, even 
after Mark went on 
:o Albert Einstein in 
1977, he continued 
to do consulting 
work for M.I.T.. 

The eyentthat had 
the greatest impact 
on his career, Blank 
believes, was the in¬ 
troduction of the ori¬ 
ginal Adventure by 
Crowther and Wood 
for the PH 10 sys¬ 
tem. “We used to 
spend all our time 
playing the game," 
Blank says. "Dave 
Lebling, Tim Ander- 
J I felt really 











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1 111 © 




















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Playing electronic 


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Here's What's Buzzing at the Arcade! 

By TRACIE FORMAN 



the shields go down, the ship becomes 
especially vulnerable to damage. To fix 
the mess, or to refuel, dock with any 
square starbase in the area. A cheerful, 
Scottish-accented voice informs you 
when the damage is repaired. 

Klingons aren't the only dangers 
with which a fledgling starship captain 
must contend. The Anti-matter saucer 
robs the Enterprise of precious warp 
drive if it touches the ship. 

Survive the early attack waves and 
face Nomad, the mad superdroid, and 
its defensive minefield. This is where 








FHE ULTIMATE CAT-AND-MOUSE GAME! 

There’s a mouse in the house... and more than one 
crafty cat hot on his trail. Open the right doors and help 
Mappy flee the felines before the fur flies! 


MIDWAY 









We feed 
the 

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mind. 
Take 
a bite. 



Your body needs nourish¬ 
ment about three times a 
day. Your mind has an in¬ 
satiable appetite. It's the 
world’s most intricate com¬ 
puter. It feels, senses, hears, 
absorbs. From the printed 
word, for example. Meaning¬ 
ful ideas, concepts, thoughts. 

Ytu’ll find magazines and 
paperback books at 155,000 
stores all across this land. We 
think they're the kind of 
nourishment you need. More 
and more. 

Bite into some 
good reading today. 




the challenge of Star Trek really lies. 

Star Trek is sure to be a top-grosser 
in the arcades this year. If you can 
squeeze through the crowd around 
the machine, you may never want to 



BEEZER 

Not too many gamers ever stop 
wondering about what happens when 
a videogame outlives its usefulness 
among the money-munchers in the 
local arcade. Contrary to popular be¬ 
lief, there is no videogame graveyard, 
where old machines go to die with 
dignity, and they don't just fade away, 
either. To be honest, except for an 

in some corner (for nostalgia), many 
arcade owners either sell the older 
games outright or pack them away in 
some musty back room, never to be 
heard from again. 

Recently, a new type of game that 
promises to draw a lot of interest, 
especially from arcade owners, has 
appeared on the scene. Called "con¬ 
version games", these prepackaged 
kits can be installed in older coin-op 
machines within a matter of hours, 
recycling old titles into brand-new 
ones for a lot less money than it costs 
to buy a whole machine hot off the 
assembly line. The conversion kits 
make use of each unit's existing hard¬ 
ware, but they look and play so dif¬ 
ferently that it can be impossible to 
recall the "original" program that 
once filled the cabinet. 

Beezer, by Midway, is among the 
first of the conversion games to show 
up in arcades across the country. If you 


should happen to drop in a quarter or 
two, you might find it hard to believe 
that Beezer used to be a Calaxian 
machine. In fact, the game plays so 
differently that it could certainly stand 
entirely on its own as a new title. 

The originality of Beezer's play- 
mechanic makes it an absolute honey 
of a game for those who are looking 
for a little variety. The player controls 
the actions of Beezer, a renegade bee 
whose aim in life is to trap every drone 
in the beehive inside of a six-sided 
honeycomb cell. 

The interior of the hive is composed 
of revolving, three-sided walls that 
look like a pie chart sectioned into 
thirds, without the surrounding circle. 
Each wall rotates on an axis. To turn it, 
the gamer pushes his or her bee 
against it by using the tracball control¬ 
ler. The drones aren't too bright, and 
will not actively pursue Beezer, but 
their touch is fatal to the renegade. 
Still, avoiding the drones is a lot easier 
than trapping them! 

Once caught, the drones flit back 
and forth within their prisons, unable 
to push their way to freedom. There, 
they'll remain until Beezer loses a 
game life — or until the Queen Bee 

The Queen is aptly named, because 
she's a royal pain. Not only does she 
break the trapped drones out of their 
cells, but she also leaves behind her 
calling card: an egg that hatches into 
another Queen unless you eat it quick¬ 
ly- 

Of course, eating the egg is not 
totally without its advantages. The 
excess regal energy with which it 
imbues Beezer causes the insect to 
flash with new-found power and 
allows him to capture any untrapped 
drones in the hive. Capturing or trap¬ 
ping every drone on-screen earns a 
bonus and moves the gamer up to the 
next level, where there are more 
drones — and Queens. 

The most difficult thing about this 
game is that it takes a while to get the 
hang of the revolving walls. It's almost 
impossible for afirst-time player not to 

If Beezer is any indication of the 
quality of conversion games, they 
should be highly successful additions 
to the arcade circuit. Who knows? If 
the conversion games really catch on, 
the arcade of the future might be 
primarily composed of plug-in games, 
similar to the programmable home 
videogames of today. 







monsters are still there, too, wearing 
quaint little hats. When Pac-Man eats 
a piece of bonus fruit, his pursuers 
will sometimes disappear completely, 
reappearing a few seconds later in a 
totally different part of the maze. Only 
three of the monsters can disappear at 
any given time, with one to stay put, 
chosen at random by the machine. 

Even the old reliable power pill is 
randomized. Gobbling one still causes 
Inky, Blinky, and Co. to turn blue and 


retreat, but one monster could remain 
unaffected, though all flee at first. 

A number of other surprises are in 
store for the stouthearted Pac-Man- 
iac, including disappearing screens in 
which only Pac-Man, the monsters, 
and the power pills are visible. 

Anyone who loved the play me¬ 
chanic of the original Pac-Man, but 
who got bored with repetitious pat¬ 
terns, should be delighted with Bally's 
newest gobbler games. © 


SUPER PAC-MAN, 
PAC-MAN PLUS 

Bally 

The two latest additions to the 
Pac-Man family, Super Pac-Man and 
Pac-Man Plus, are guaranteed to give 
gobbler fans everywhere a brand-new 
run for their money. 

Super Pac-Man is a variation on the 
classic maze-chase, endowing the 
round yellow hero with an ability to 
develop super-size and super-speed in 
the never-ending quest to eat every 
object on the playfield. Instead of the 
usual dots, the muncher is called upon 
to eat everything from pretzels to 
brightly-colored sneakers, although 
he displays no sign of indigestion. 

The familiar power pills are still there 
for the taking, in addition to several 
other items of interest. The keys have 
to be gobbled to unlock random gates, 
and eating the star is worth a variable 

But the best thing on the menu is 
















Step Up and Ask EC's Answer Man 

By THE GAME DOCTOR 


H ello, gamers! Great to see you out 
there, stacked twelve-deep inside 
my lovely, hyper-air conditioned wait¬ 
ing room! You've read all the old 
magazines, I see. Good, good, you 
know a well-stocked waiting room will 
bring back patients faster than any¬ 
thing. 

Plenty of new ColecoVision owners, 
eh? Lots of questions this month, and 
most of them, as usual, are excellent. 
Just for a change of pace, let's save the 
T-shirt winning "Q" for a while and 
just take the customers as they come.. 


Q: / would like to know if Atari is 
suing Coleco over production of its 
VCS emulator/expansion module, or 
have the two companies come to an 
understanding? Also, does the word 
“Atari" mean anything? I have heard 


from a small bird that it sure does. 

(M. Kevin Tomkies, 
address unknown) 
A: Although Atari did, indeed, take 
Coleco to court, the two titans of 
videogaming have since come to an 
amicable agreement. Under the terms 
of this understanding, Coleco has in¬ 
troduced a 2600 work-alike, dubbed 
the "Gemini", in addition to the Col¬ 
ecoVision expansion module in ques¬ 
tion, under a royalty arrangement with 
Atari. 

As for the meaning of the word 
"atari", that’s an old one, Kevin. Nolan 
Bushnell took the company's name 
from the ancient oriental game Go, in 
which the word “atari" is the equiva¬ 
lent of "check" in chess. But have you 
heard about Nolan's new videogame 
company, Sente? Its name derives 
from the word in Go, used when the 



player under "check" or "atari", re¬ 
verses the position and places his 
adversary in "checkmate". Heh, heh. 

While we're chattering about the 
origins of company monickers, did we 
mention recently that "Coleco" is a 
shortened version of the "Connecticut 
Leather Company"? If anybody asks 
you where you heard it, tell 'em a big 
bird told you. 

Q: After Taito's recent court battles 
with Edgar Rice Burroughs' estate 
(over the use of a Tarzan-like charac¬ 
ter in Jungle King), will Nintendo's 
Popeye and Sega's Buck Rogers be 
pulled off the streets because they 
interfere with existing copyrights? 

(Bill Harroun, Aledo, IL) 
A: The difference between Jungle 
King and the other titles you men¬ 
tioned is considerable. Unlike Sherlock 
Holmes, Dracula and any number of 
other literary creations whose rights 
have since lapsed into eminent domain 
(definition: anyone can use them in 
any context, free of charge), Tarzan is 
still very much a licensed property. 
Even Burroughs is dead, but his estate 
is still around to hold fast to all rights 
concerning that character. 

While it’s true that Jungle King 
doesn't mention "Tarzan" in so many 
words, the "Jungle King" title and 
appearance of the on-screen pro¬ 
tagonist gave the Burroughs estate 
considerable legal leverage. Rather 
than go up against those litigious 
sharpshooters, Taito bowed nicely and 
transformed their Lord Greystoke- 
done into a white hunter. 

Both Popeye and Buck Rogers are 
fully licensed from the companies 
which exclusively possess the rights 






June. How can this be, since Tempest 
uses a vector-graphics monitor? 

(Frank Vawter, Riverside, CA) 
A: Boy, you guys are cartoonin' 
fools! First, Bill Harroun lays a Pac-tune 
on the old cartridge croaker, and now 
Frank presents me with a very good 
sketch of Garfield, my favorite feline, 
enjoying a game of "Lasagna Flunt". 
Nothin' like a little chuckle to keep the 
day in perspective! 

Oh, yes, your question. Okay, 
Frank, first of all, rememberthat Aster¬ 
oids was also a vector contest, and 
Atari translated that one for the 2600 
pretty darned well! In fact, on a recent 
visit to several of the top coin-op 
companies, the prevailing feeling was, 




"Anything vector can do, raster can do 
even better!" Scientists have made 
such strides in digitized raster graphics 
and play-object movement that it is 
now feasible to produce raster ver¬ 
sions of vector coin-ops. 

For a look at what's happening in 
the world of vector graphics, take a 
look at this month's "Players Guide" 
under the section "Whatever hap¬ 
pened to Vector Graphics?” 


On page 111 in your January, 1983 
issue, there is an advertisement of an 
emulator for the VIC-20 that will 
allow it to play Atari 2600 cartridges. 
Does it really work? How does it work 
with two-player games? 

(Brett Spivey, Bedford, TX) 
A: The device you're referring to, 
Brett, is from Protecto. According to 
EG's Commodore maven, Tom Ben- 
ford, the product does just what it 


Q: In a recent EG you mentioned an 
upcoming game for ColecoVision ti¬ 
tled Victory. Is that the Exidy coin-op 
that just came out? Also, is Coleco 
coming out with new joysticks soon? 

(Brian McIntosh, Syosset, NY) 
A: It is, indeed, a home version of the 
Exidy coin-op. You’ll also be happy to 
know that a new set of ColecoVision 
joysticks should be available by the 
time you read this. If that's not the 


My oi , 
distribution. Up here in the Fox Val¬ 
ley, we currently have access to eight 
ColecoVision cartridges, discounting 
Donkey Kong and Turbo. My nephew 
recently moved to California and has 
informed me that the stores out there 
carry at least 20 ColecoVision pro¬ 
grams! How long will it take us to 
catch up? Thanks much. 

(Rod Quaintanie 
Combined Locks, Wl) 
A: First answer: I don't believe so. 

ledge, lift only one specimen at a time. 

Second answer: Judging by the 
postmark on your letter, your nephew 
may be exaggerating somewhat the 
number of ColecoVision titles available 
in sunny California. Since Turbo, even 
the Doc has seen only Mouse Trap, 



Donkey Kong Junior, Space Panic and 
Space Fury, with new titles such as 
Rocky Battles the Champ and Tarzan, 

almost ready for release. So don't 

I guess that about wraps things up 
this time out. Remember, may the 
palm of your hand never grow too 
sweaty to move a tracball! Aloha. 0 














Computer Ambush: Hit the Beach! 

By NEIL SHAPIRO 





































the turn will simulate — it's off to the 

First thing a commander must do is 
give the men their orders. This involves 
writing a short battle-program for 
each man which governs him for the 
turn. Although it seems complicated at 
first, the orders use easy-to-remember 
abbreviations that simply describe the 
actions, which are much the same as 
real soldiers would be taking. 

Let’s say that you want Sarge 
Padooka to run in a zig-zag manner for 
a distance of six feet. He should fall 
down behind a convenient hedge, and 
quickly prepare his rifle to fire and scan 
the street in front of him. If he sees a 
German that he has a good chance of 
hitting, he should fire. Otherwise, he 
should hold his fire. The program for 
this set of actions would be: MI12R 


MRIOF PRFA5099. Not too hard. 

Padooka's program would tell him 
to first Move Irregular in direction "I" 
for two squares at a Run (MI12R). 
Then he would move in a Regular 
manner, facing in direction "1", for 0 
squares to Fall prone (MRIOF). Then 
he would Prepare his Rifle (PR). Finally 
he would prepare to Fire on the Area 
he is facing and shoot any target which 
he has a 50% or greater chance of 
blasting for the next 9.9 seconds 
(FA5099). 

In this manner, the armchair general 
programs all of the soldiers in the 
army. They can run, dodge, crawl, look 
around, fall prone, stand up, sneak, 
wait, prepare rifles, automatic rifles 
and machine guns, ready their knives, 
bayonets or even garrottes, prepare 
grenades or throw them and, if the 




















































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Instrument, Atari, Apple and Com¬ 
modore computers, depending on 
which is best-suited to specific activ¬ 
ity. Instructors at Computer Camp 
Inc., as is typical at such institutions, all 
hold advanced degrees in computer 
science. Most have camping experi¬ 
ence, too. There's one staff member to 
every five campers — and as one 
former camper testifies, "Gee, if we 
learned this much in 12 days in school, 
we'd all be geniuses." 

Computer Curriculum: LOGO, BASIC 
(three Levels), Pascal, Assembler, 
Robotics, Electronics, Graphics, Artifi¬ 
cial Intelligence, floppy discs, and 
operating systems (only one printer on 
the facilities). 

Recreational Program: indoor games, 
day hikes, river-rafting and horseback 
riding (check for location), movies, 
arts and crafts, drama, barbecues, and 
tournaments. 

Locations: Starting mid-July, Comput¬ 
er Camp locations can be found in 
Santa Barbara and Lake Tahoe. New 
Hampshire's Lake Winnipesaukie and 
Sequoia National Park offer four and 



Learning to Write 
Computer Programs 
May Soon Rival 
Playing Baseball 
As a Popular 
Form of Activity 
At Summer Camps 


five series of two-week sessions for 
$895. Santa Barbara's special features 
include the observatory, skateboard¬ 
ing, and competition swimming and 
diving. At Tahoe, you can also go 
boating, mountaineering, fishing and 
even snorkeling. Lake Winnipesaukie, 
where “On Golden Pond" was filmed, 
offers boating, and marine biology as 

Computer Camp Inc. has just 
opened a new camp in Hawaii. A 
two-week session there costs $1200. 

The Computer Camp location staf¬ 
fers are most excited about currently 
beingsituated in England, at St. Bede's 
Eastborne School. For a whopping 
$2400, campers will get three weeks 
of computer instruction and recrea¬ 
tional activities such as archery and 

British Isles, including tours of The 
Tower of London and Westminster 
Abbey. 

Call or write to Computer Camp Inc. 
at: 1235 Coast Village Road, Suite G, 
Santa Barbara, CA 93108; telephone 
(805) 965-7777. 


CHAMPLAIN COLLEGE 

Located in the mountains of Bur¬ 
lington, VT, Champlain College's 
Computer Camp philosophy is "rec¬ 
reation and education go hand-in- 
hand — cultural activities are stressed 
as well as new age technology." Here, 
education can mean anything from 
joke-telling contests to soccer, 
Shakespeare, baseball and BASIC. 
There's classroom computer instruc¬ 
tion and lab time, in which each camp¬ 
er has a Commodore computer disk 
drive and printer on which to work. At 
night, there are outdoor activities, free 
lab time and seminars on such topics 
as data basing and word processing. 
Computer Curriculum: Three levels of 
BASIC, Pascal, Fortran and Assem¬ 
bler, plus field trips to IBM, GE and 

Recreational Program: Sailing, fishing, 
hiking, soccer, basketball, racquetball, 
tennis, campfire roasts and more. 
Locations: Champlain College, Burl¬ 
ington, VT. Two-week sessions cost 
$750, four weeks $1450 and six 
weeks, $2150. Check for June and July 






























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careful. 


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Excitement Times Four for the Vectrex 


A ll across the nation, gamers are 
fighting the same domestic bat¬ 
tle, the unending struggle for control 
of the family television set. Getting 
some time with the tube for a session 
of home arcading frequently means 
heading off baby brother's plans to 
view reruns of "Little Rascals" or 
"The Flintstones". 

Stand-alone games are made to 
order for this situation. If the televi¬ 
sion set is temporarily committed to 
"Monday Night Football", you can 
still get a pretty good game out of one 
of the ultra-sophisticated hand-held 


By JOYCE WORLEY 

or table-top units now on the mar¬ 
ket. And the current king of the stand¬ 
alone games is Vectrex, a stand¬ 
alone cartridge-based system that fea¬ 
tures a 9-in. diagonal vector graphics 
monitor. 

Vectrex, which comes with Mine 
Storm as the resident game, carries a 
suggested retail price of about $200. 
Cartridges for the machine, also 
manufactured by the General Con¬ 
sumer Electronics division of Milton 
Bradley, cost approximately $30 

A shortage of titles barely dampen¬ 


ed gamers' enthusiasm for Vectrex 
when GCE introduced it shortly be¬ 
fore last Christmas. The company's 
designers are hard at work expanding 
the software library, which may in¬ 
clude more than 20 different contests 
by the fourth quarter of this year. All 
make use of the brilliant line graphics 
possible with a vector graphics system 
such as found in Atari's Asteroids 
Deluxe coin-op. The Vectrex moni¬ 
tor produces only black and white 
images, but each game comes with a 
special multi-color overlay to add 
color and excitement to the visual 
presentation. 

In this month's installment of 
"Stand-Alone Scene", I'll depart from 
the usual format to cover four of the 
cartridges currently available for this 
exciting stand-alone programmable 

BEDLAM 

GCE/Vectrex/$30 

Bedlam turns Tempest inside out to 
produce a shoot-'em-up with offbeat 
appeal. The gamer controls a ship 
which must blast aliens as they ad¬ 
vance on its central position from the 
edges of the playfield. For example, 
the first screen is shaped like a star. 
Aliens appear at five various points 
and rush toward the middle of the 
figure where the arcader's craft is 













































ARMOR ATTACK 

GCE/Vectrex/$30 

You're caught behind enemy lines 
in an occupied city. The player maneu¬ 
vers a jeep through streets and alleys, 
watching for enemy tanks that patrol 
the area. The best strategy is to hide 
behind buildings and wait for a chance 
to attack from the shadows. There's 
no place to hide from the helicopter 
that prowls the sky, so shooting it 
down is high priority. 

The overlay for Armor Attack pro¬ 
vides a woodsy backdrop for the 
brightly-lit city buildings. The joystick 
rotates the jeep, and two buttons 
allow the player to move the jeep 
slightly to the left or right for perfect 
alignment with the target. 

The jeep first appears in the middle 
of the bombed-out city; then an 
enemy tank rolls in from the outskirts 
of town. It's kill or be killed in this 


conflict. Fire toward the tank. The first 
hit dismantles it, but it takes a second 
one to destroy the target. When you 
finish one tank, two more appear to 
take up the battle. As if that wasn't 
enough of a problem, the enemy 
helicopter flies random missions over 
the city, armed and ready to fight. 
Your missiles are effective against the 
whirly bird, but each time you destroy 



one chopper, another appears to 
menace the jeep. 

Players start each game with five 
jeeps and get an additional vehicle 
when they destroy five copters. 

The secret to doing well at this game 
is careful aim. Don’t fire wildly. This 
accomplishes little or nothing. Instead, 
concentrate on hitting each individual 
target. The helicopter is the prime 
objective. Each birdie is worth 1,000 
points, and also increases the value of 
any tanks destroyed after blasting the 
chopper. 

Anyone who enjoyed the Cinema- 
tronics coin-op should love the Vec- 
trex version of Armor Attack. The 
graphics actually border on clever. 
(The helicopter is a real masterpiece of 
cute design!) There are three game- 
play options. The most advanced con¬ 
test doesn't draw the buildings on¬ 
screen, but forces you to drive the jeep 
through a blind maze. All versions can 
be played either solitaire or by two 
gamers as allies against a common foe. 

Armor Attack has charms to soothe 
the savage beasts of "cute game” fans 
while giving the action buffs all they 
can handle. Even beginners will be 
able to enjoy the first skill level, but the 
more advanced screens are sure to 



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give even the I 


BERZERK 

CCE/Vectex/$30 

You're trapped in a world you never 
made, a spaghetti maze of corridors 
and rooms filled with robots. And 
when you clear one room of metal 
monsters in this fine version of the 
Williams coin-op, there's always 
another chamber packed with hostile 
guards waiting on the other side of the 

That's not the only problem, either. 
Stay in any one room too long, and 
your digital warrior will come face to 
face with Evil Otto. The soulless smiler 
appears at the edge of the playfield 
and makes directly for the on-screen 
hero. It destroys everything it touches, 
so the only possible strategy is to head 
for the hills when Evil Otto is on the 
hunt. Even the walls of the maze are 
dangerous. Their electrical sting is fa¬ 
tal on touch. 

The situation isn't totally hopeless 
for the player's on-screen representa- 

gun, or simply flee from a tight situa¬ 
tion by running through an exit. Of 
course, this just puts your hero in a 



cross-fire in one piece can require 
some fancy stepping. 

The arcader begins each game with 
a supply of three humanoids, earning 
a reinforcement every 5,000 points. 
Every destroyed robot is worth 50 
points, plus a bonus of 10 points per 
foe if the player clears a whole room. 

Straight shooting is the best way to 
win any game, but a little strategy can 
help make up for any defects in aim. 
The robots are programmed to follow 
you, so sometimes you can lead the 
stupid creatures into each other or the 
wails, thus destroying them without 

you and Evil Otto, Otto will crush it for 

Berzerk is a great game, no matter 
which system you play it on. The 
Vectrex edition is one of the best. 


new room with a fresh stock of oppo¬ 
nents. Anything is better than a certain 
death, though. 

The room guards have no weapons 
in the first room, so it's easy to knock 
them off quickly once the player learns 
to steer safely around the lethal walls 
without touching them. The automa¬ 
tons are armed — and faster—in later 
stages of the contest, and escaping a 


STAR TREK — THE CAME 

CCE/Vectrex/$30 

As Captain Kirk, you command the 
starship Enterprise. The mission is to 
travel through space, seeking the 
Klingons and Romulans that inhabit 
this part of the universe. The goal is to 
get the Klingon mother ship. Destroy 
enemy spacecraft on each of the nine 
levels, until the Enterprise finally 
































WISDOM is. 



giving 
to the 
March 
of 
Dimes | 


Birth defects 
are forever. 
Unless you help. 



reaches the massive mother ship. 

A unique "black hole" provides a 
short-cut to the enemy mother ship. It 
appears on-screen as a small flashing 
box. If the Enterprise flies through this 
hole, it comes out on the ninth level to 
face the dreaded Klingon killer ship. 
Gamers can choose where the black 
hole appears. Usually, it's on level one, 
and passing through skips over all the 
intermediate battles the ship would 
have had to fight on the way to reach 
the ninth level. If you choose instead to 
progress sector by sector, just ignore 
the black hole. Battle the enemies on 
each level, dodging their torpedoes, or 
using the protective shield to avoid 
destruction. Some gamers may prefer 
to take a halfway course, putting the 


black hole transporter in, for example, 
section three. That way, you can have 
all the hot action on the first two levels, 
and still arrive fresh on the ninth to 
face the Klingon dreadnaught. 

When the starcruiser gets to level 
nine, either by fighting or taking the 
shortcut through the black hole, the 
Klingon mother ship immediately 
starts firing salvos of torpedoes. 

Keep an eye on the gauges at the 
bottom of the screen. The line on the 
left indicates remaining laser power, 
while the one on the right monitors 
shield strength. When the gauges get 
low, the Enterprise must refuel; there's 
a space station in each sector. Line up 
the gunsight with the door of the 
space station, then press the power 
link to refill the tanks. 

Star Trek — The Game is outstand¬ 
ing, filled with high-skill action and 
striking visuals. The spaceships are 
drawn in bright linework against a 
pretty blue sky. The viewing window 
of the Enterprise is a golden square of 
light in the darkness of space. Q 




























































































Sensational, a real thriller... 
Iti lames Bond all the way" 

"The action was so involving, it made me 
feel just like the master spy himself." 

-Daily Platter 

"Karate kicks , jumps , lasers and more..." 

"A truly unique hoirte video game. Captures Bond at his best." 


"Knife throwers , 
gunmen and the 
James Bond theme 
to boot..." 

"It's Bond eveiy step 
of the way. Right clown 
to the musical theme. 

The thrills are 
non-stop." 

-The Rolling Pebble 

"The longer 
the game went 
on, the more 
furious the 
chase 
became..." 

"When Bond 
leaped from train 
to frain, my heart 
skipped a beat." 

-Boston.•OrB*' 



-Morley Unsafer 

"You'll try to 
capture the 
T Fabergegems 
while bounding 
across the speeding 
Octopussy Circus 

Train ..." 

'The Bond 
home video 
game is a 
priceless gem." 
-Vincent Can'tbe 



WR4RKER BROTHERS 
















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tom these scans, nor do we offer anything 
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)t support them and dd let us know.
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